Surgical capacity at Chilliwack General Hospital will be reduced by a third, starting this January.

CGH is closing one of its three operating rooms from the first week of January to the end of March as a way to cut surgical costs.

A Chilliwack surgeon is concerned the closure will have a detrimental effect on the overall health of the community.

“The waitlist for surgeries will increase immediately,” said Dr. Richard Schwarz, a general surgeon at CGH and the chairman of the local medical advisory committee. “Patient care is going to be delayed, which could potentially lead to negative outcomes.”

Last August the Fraser Health Authority mandated that all hospitals across the region cut their elective surgery budget by 10 to 15 per cent, leaving it to the individual hospitals to decide how those cuts would be doled out.

CGH decided to temporarily close one of the operating rooms, as well as its eye centre.

Surgeries affected include cataracts, gall bladder, hip replacement, knee replacement, etc.

But high priority, urgent, necessary procedures that include cancer and cardiac surgeries will not be affected, said Rowena Rizotti, executive director of CGH.

“All the surgeries that need to be done will be done, but any elective surgery that can safely wait a little longer will have to wait,” said Rizotti.

“We are trying to minimize the impact on patient care, but obviously there will still be somewhat of an impact.”

Chilliwack’s waitlist for elective surgeries is currently anywhere from a month to several months, depending on the procedure. Dr. Schwarz said that increased wait times could result in increased emergency cases.

“Patients who would have had their surgery done on a scheduled basis, could become emergency cases because of the long waits, which will then increase healthcare costs,” said Dr. Schwarz.

For example, a gall bladder patient who receives a scheduled surgery would be in the hospital, on average, for a total of 10 hours and would require one follow-up appointment with their surgeon. If a patient becomes an emergency case, they could be in the hospital for up to five days, costing the system several times more money than if they’d received the surgery in a timely manner, said Dr. Schwarz. And potentially costing the patient further complications.

Dr. Schwarz said that the waitlist won’t ever go away without a significant boost in FHA funding.

“It will just keep on growing,” he said.

The operating-room closure is in addition to a two-week closure at Christmas and a three-week closure during the Olympics.

No CGH staff has been cut.

kbartel@theprogress.com